Thursday, 30 May 2013

Direct narrative is when you have the reader experience a scene through
a character. Doing what they do, feeling what they feel.

Indirect narrative is when the reader is told what just happened
without getting a blow by blow report.

In most cases you’re going to write in direct narrative as much as
possible. It’s more immediate and engaging, and makes it easier for the reader
to connect with the character. First person narrative in particular is mainly
written in this mode.

But there are times when you don’t want to live through every second of
a story. Knowing when it is beneficial to the story to live through every
moment, and when it’s just padding things out unnecessarily isn’t always
obvious. Fortunately there’s a rule of thumb that can help make it clear which
way to go.

Thursday, 23 May 2013

The inciting incident is the thing that happens
somewhere in the first part of a story that changes things for the main
character and puts them on the path to adventure (or romance, or tragedy, or
whatever).

It’s a pretty well understood element in fiction,
and even writers who aren’t aware of it will naturally work it into the story.

However, what isn’t always as obvious is that a story
has more than one inciting incident. A lot more.

Monday, 20 May 2013

Each character in a scene needs a goal. Obviously
the main character’s goal is the most important, but every character should be
aiming for something, and those goals should be acted on and in doing so affect
one another.

This doesn’t just refer to the protagonist/antagonist
relationship, it should be true of all characters in a scene.

Monday, 6 May 2013

The recent post I did (HERE) on condensing your
story into a line or two received some interesting feedback so this follow-up
post will take a deeper look at the techniques involved in summing up the story into something short, easy to understand and yet
interesting. And the pitfalls along the way.

Bear in mind the idea isn’t to come up with
a beautifully crafted slogan that makes people want to rush out and buy the
book on the strength of the logline alone. Your job isn’t to invent bubblegum
that tastes like a three course meal. If people want to experience those
flavours they should just eat a three course meal.

This will be more about telling somebody what the
story's about, whether they be an agent or your mother.